


The Voice (Roar) of my Soul

by BowAndDagger



Category: Bleach, Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Gen, Hyorinmaru isn't, Naruto as Toshiro's reincarnation, Toshiro is asleep, don't mess with his boys, or else, protective!Hyorinmaru
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-13
Updated: 2018-04-10
Packaged: 2019-03-30 22:33:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13961469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BowAndDagger/pseuds/BowAndDagger
Summary: Naruto isn’t lonely. He was never alone, after all.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Something that had been in my folders for some time now...  
> Enjoy!

Naruto isn’t lonely. He was never alone, after all.

All along there has been a voice in his head. A man’s voice - calm and strong, young but deep and solemn – resonating from deep within him. It whispers constantly to him, commands and advices alike: “aim higher”, “run!”, “duck left”, “turn there!”, “eat more slowly”.

 

 

Naruto _knows_ that voice, because It has always been there. He even has a feeling that It was here even before his birth… It is a constant. It is immutable. An integral part of his life ( _ ~~lives~~_ ).

 

 

It taught him to talk, when no one else in the orphanage spend time with him to develop his language skills. It taught him to read when pre-Academy school started and none of the teachers wanted to help him. Everything that Naruto knows, the Voice taught him.

 

 

Naruto doesn’t know where it comes from and frankly, he doesn’t care.

At first, when he was still very young, he used to think it was normal, that everyone had a Voice in his head like he did. It’s only when he talked about It to Jiji when he was five that he came to understand it was abnormal.

He doesn’t remember what happened that day, not entirely, he just felt really sleepy all of a sudden and when he woke up, Jiji was discussing with a man with long blond hair in a ponytail.

He does, however, remember the words muttered between them; things like “ _not the seal_ ”, “ _not a threat_ ” and “ _perhaps an imaginary friend?_ ”.

 

(The Voice in his head was colder than ice, howling with protective fury, affronted by the betrayal and manipulation.)

 

(Naruto thinks that, just for a moment, he saw glistening scales made of ice surrounding him. Or maybe it was green hair and an X-shaped scar. But it was gone when he blinked.)

 

 

Naruto never talked about the Voice after that. Similarly, as if woken up by that event, the Voice became more present and interacted with him more.

All in all, the young boy saw it as a win.

 

 

When the Academy started, Naruto came in class with his head bursting with information about all kind of swords, of fighting styles and, in particular, of a special sword called a Zanpakuto.

Unbeknown to all, the pariah of the village came to his first day of class with the knowledge of a hardened Shinigami captain, the calm pragmatism of a dragon, the genius of a Namikaze and the mischief characteristic of an Uzumaki.

 

 

(This, of course, changed a lot of things.)


	2. Chapter 2

When Hitsugaya Toshiro dies it’s after several centuries of service to the Gotei 13. He dies as a Shinigami; on the battlefields, surrounded by Hollows, Menos Grande and some Arrancars.

He saves the men and women under his command; gives them time to escape.

That’s all that matter.

 

(His only regret is that he didn’t have time to say goodbye.)

 

 

But of course someone up there must really have it in for him – giving him a short body was apparently not enough to mess with him – and things don’t end there.

 

When a Shinigami – or a soul in Soul Society – dies they get sent to the reincarnation circle; provided, of course, that their soul isn’t eaten or destroyed.

This – what _should_ have happened - didn’t came to be.

 

That – something so incongruous, so…so _Kurosaki Ichigo_ \- is what happens: Toshiro begins to loose conscience of who he is, like all souls being reincarnated do. And then everything goes to hell.

He gets reincarnated. _With all of his memories intact_.

In the part of his mind that is still more or less awake, Toshiro blames Kurosaki.

 

-_-_-_-_-

 

Zanpakuto are forged from a part of their Shinigami’s soul. When a Shinigami is reincarnated into the Living World, as a Human, the Zanpakuto follows, reintegrates themselves to the soul they were born from. That’s not what happens.

Instead, Hyorinmaru is very much aware and conscious of what’s going on. And Toshiro is slumbering, his memories still whole if dormant for the moment.

But they are reborn. As a little blond baby with whiskers marks on his cheeks.

(Hyorinmaru privately thinks that he is adorable. But he is biased since, blond or white-haired, his wielder will always be the centre of his world.)

 

There is also malice in the air, a giant nine-tailed fox, and a couple that is obviously his wielder’s new parents fighting the beast. Hyorinmaru roars. But he is helpless.

 

It would’ve been nice for his wielder not to end up as an orphan again.

 

The Zanpakuto can only bear witness of their last moments, their last words. He takes those and carves them into his memory, take them from little Naruto short term memory and slowly nudge them towards his long term memory.

The boy won’t remember, not clearly, but the feeling, the _love_ , will remain.

The words and the love of his parents will be inscribed, _carved_ , into his being.

 

 

In this world, Uzumaki Naruto will never doubt, will never falter. He’ll never wonder if he was abandoned, if his parents never loved him. He’ll know instinctively of their devotion, their sacrifice, to him.

 

In this world, Uzumaki Naruto will grow up surrounded by love. He will be happy, truly happy, despite the whispers and the hate-filled looks, despite the indifference and the abuse.

 

There are still pranks, because Uzumaki Naruto isn’t Uzumaki Naruto without pranks. But they will be different. More inspired, cleverer, more oriented towards stealth and evasion. There won’t be only one prankster, but several: a young boy who wants to train to be a shinobi silent and lethal, a dragon who transforms training into games and tricks, and a captain whose strategic mind is easily adapted to planning pranks.

 

(There will be two others, too. Later.)

 

 

 

(There is a seal deep in Naruto’s psyche; one which keeps a part of a father’s soul in case of emergency and one to guard a part of a mother’s soul to gain a legacy.

Hyorinmaru doesn’t know of this world’s seals, but he can guess this one's purpose thanks to his wielder’s knowledge of Kido and what Naruto can glean about the sealing art. It takes years to gather sufficient knowledge.

But when he does…

 

He unravels the seal, stops it from releasing the souls it holds and anchors them.)

 

(It will last a few years instead of a few minutes.

But it’ll be enough for a son to know his parents.

Enough for parents to raise the son they died for.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wasn't prepared for the bit about Minato and Kushina. It came out of nowhere. But it fits, so...  
> I hope you enjoyed reading!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that was quicker than I thought it'd be...

 

Chakra is weird. Both Hyorinmaru and Toshiro agree on this. Well, Toshiro agree when he’s awake which doesn’t happen regularly.

 

Of course, the nine-tailed issue doesn’t help.

He – She? They? Hyorinmaru doesn’t know so he’s going to stick to ‘he’ until he’s told otherwise – is literally oozing chakra and it’s damn hard to control the stuff.

 

The Zanpakuto had started Naruto on control exercise practically since the boy could stay awake for a few minutes. But it was _reiatsu_ control exercise, not chakra. And now that they are in the Academy the teachers are expecting Naruto to perform jutsu using, of course, _chakra_.

Which neither Hyorinmaru nor Toshiro or Naruto know _how_.

 

Not that Naruto is stupid – no matter what his classmates or those oh so delightful so-called teachers say. It’s just that he can easily perform kido, from low level ones to the higher ones, with no difficulties whatsoever or, sometimes, without incantations.

But chakra is a big no.

For the moment.

 

Once, he gave his teachers a collective heart attack when, during a spar, he jumped higher than he should have been able to without chakra and took a step on _thin air_.

This demonstration only gave way to another not-nap, a visit from the blond-in-a-pony-tail man and a whispered discussion with Jiji – whom Hyorinmaru was seriously starting to hold in contempt. Murmurs about a new Kekkei Genkai began that day.

 

Hyorinmaru is becoming real tired of people walking willy-nilly in his wielder’s head without having the decency to tell him what they’re doing.

On the plus side, Toshiro is a bit more awake after those excursions.

That’s what pushed Hyorinmaru to study seals. Seals are easy; you don’t need chakra to activate them because seals are a purely mental thing: their only limit is the crafter and user’s imagination.

 

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

 

Everything started shortly after Naruto began his first Academy year.

Chakra control exercises are the norm, but there is no jutsu yet; just theory and some simple explanation of the elemental affinities, and the difference between yin and yang chakra.

 

(There is no mention of a pre-existing ice affinity. They’ll have to do some research before starting to freeze their enemies.)

 

Then the teachers begin to explain exploding and storage seals.

The three of them perk up.

 

Sealing is easy.

Personally Naruto wants to bash his head on a wall each time he reads a sealing theory book. Said theory is, for lack of better terms, bland as hell.

 

(He’s six years old and yet he’s already able to read and comprehend something adults thrice his age often find beyond understanding.)

 

His pranks, already legendary, become even more unpredictable and untraceable. He seeds chaos in the village with gleeful abandon.

 

(Hyorinmaru and Toshiro watch with dark satisfaction as those who spat on Naruto and refused to admit him in their establishment get caught in the blast of several colourful explosions.)

 

(In the aftermath of the Kyubi attack, many shinobi had to do back-to-back missions in order to put on the pretence that everything was fine. As a consequence, security in the village was much more lacking than it should have been.

By pranking people left and right, shinobi and civilians alike, Naruto was, without really meaning to, pointing out the holes in the village’s surveillance.

These holes were then quickly repaired. Therefore allowing Konoha to either catch red-handed or identify several foreign spies.)

 

There is also the puzzling fact that this world’s seals are disturbingly similar to the kido seals Toshiro and Hyorinmaru are familiar with…

So they study. Naruto put to the test his stealth skill by infiltrating Library and their restricted-to-Shinobi-only areas.

The sealing books sit in a dusty dark corner. Proof enough that this world’s shinobi are stupid since they don’t bother studying something as life-saving as seals…

 

That’s when they learn of the Uzumaki Clan.

 

Toshiro rages at the news of an entire clan gone because they were feared. Again, there is another disturbing parallel with their old world. The exile of the Shiba Caln as well as the execution of several of its members resonate in his mind.

 

Naruto wonders at the idea of a clan. A big family. There have to be some survivors, right? Hyorinmaru is his family, a part of his soul, and while his life and memories slowly merge with Toshiro’s, the white-haired Shinigami is like a big brother to him. But… But Naruto would really like to have people around him in the waking world, too.

 

Hyorinmaru begins to research.

 

(Naruto’s mother had a bright smile and fiery red hair. She was an Uzumaki.

The Uzumaki Clan were known for their mastery of the Sealing Arts.

And there is a seal deep in Naruto’s psyche. One that the dragon knows doesn’t hold the fox prisoner.)

 

(In this world, Naruto is a bit more wary, a bit more suspicious. He’s also not lonely.

This brings some changes: he is close to the Third Hokage but not as much as he would have been had he been alone in his head.

There, with the wary grumbles of a Captain accustomed to politics… While he loves the old man, he knows there is a big fox sealed in his mind. And Sarutobi told him nothing about it, kept the secret and done nothing when villagers and shinobi alike try to make his life a living hell.

So Naruto smiles and laughs and pranks.

But he keeps his distance.)

 

(This village is corrupted and is keeping his heritage, the names of his parents from him. It lies to his face, and spits at his back.

Hyorinmaru can tell him nothing of his parents except of their love for him, only of their final words or that he got his father’s hair and his mother’s smile. But the Zanpakuto know nothing of the politics of the village, and only the basics of its history, and so can’t tell the boy of whom they were.)

 

 

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

 

The Kyubi killed his parents.

It was sealed into a baby.

But can a child’s mind resist a creature of hate and malice?

The boy must be the Fox, then. ~~He~~ It is evil.

But…

 

But the blond boy smiles with such warmth, even in the faces of those who hit him, make him stumble and spit at him.

The boy is happy. And he's just that: a growing little boy.

 

During the day at the Academy, when there is a free period, he draws dragons made of ice, stunning green eyes framed by white hair and non-descriptive figures called ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’. The ‘Mom’ has long flowing red hair and the ‘Dad’ has bright yellow hair…

 

(Iruka really should talk about those drawings to the Hokage, because he’s fairly sure Naruto shouldn’t be aware of his parentage.

But he stays silent.

It may be the musings of an orphan, or simply a coincidence, after all.

That, and Naruto always seems happier after drawing them.)

 

(Without even trying, just by listening to Hyorinmaru recounts the events surrounding his birth, Naruto gets an ally and a second brother-figure. One who stays away at first, before slowly coming closer.

He also gains a chakra instructor.)

 

(Chakra is still weird, though.)

 

 

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

 

Being a reincarnation changes things, but not everything.

Naruto is not the Dead-last. He’s firmly in the upper-middle of the class, if only because he has difficulties with handling his chakra.

But he’s still mocked, still considered as an idiot and someone who will never succeed.

And in the shadows the Hokage, the Anbu, the Jounin and Danzo watch.

What they perceive as a new Kekkai Genkai attracts and holds their attention.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
